PHYS 500A (Graduate Quantum Mechanics)
Syllabus, Spring 2021
Instructor: Kristan Jensen
Email: kristanj (at) uvic.ca
Office: Elliott 216
Office phone: N/A
Office hours: TBD
Content:
This one-semester course is an introduction to quantum mechanics at the graduate level. One
semester is hardly enough time to review the highlights of the quantum theory as it existed in the
early 20th century, let alone to cover more modern developments. Most of your learning will take
place on your own, in reading texts and solving problems. In the class meetings we will cover the
following topics:
•From Stern-Gerlach to the postulates of quantum mechanics; linear algebra (5lectures).
•Hamiltonian and time evolution (3lectures).
•A landscape of quantum mechanical systems (3lectures).
•Path integrals and Dirac charge quantization (2lectures).
•Angular momentum and the rotation group (4lectures).
•Hydrogen-like atoms (2lectures).
•Approximate methods (3lectures).
•Scattering (3lectures).
There will be some other topics, like density matrices, which you will explore in Problem Sets.
Textbook and supplementary material:
1. The primary text for this course is Sakurai & Napolitano, Modern Quantum Mechanics.
2. Hitoshi Murayama has excellent lecture notes accompanying the Graduate Quantum Mechanics
course Physics 221A at UC Berkeley. They are available at http://hitoshi.berkeley.edu.
3. I am also making my pdf Lecture Notes available. They can be found on the class Brightspace
page. I will periodically update them throughout the semester.
4. There are many other books that you should use as resources in addition to S&N. I recommend
Feynman & Hibbs, Quantum Mechanics and Path Integrals; Baym, Lectures on Quantum Mechanics;
and Dirac, The Principles of Quantum Mechanics.
Course format:
Lectures: Monday/Thursday 1100-1220, online.
Problem Sets: Roughly every other week.
Final exam: There will be a take-home exam during the Final Exam period,
between April 15 and April 27.
Grades:
1. Final: 35%
2. Problem sets: 65%
